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The entire point of the Borg is that they’re what the federation would be without the prime directive and a value placed on consent. If the Borg asked nicely, they’d be the Federation.
The Federation initially rejected Seven’s attempt to officially join because of their Borg implants
I’ve never heard of that, source? It sounds like you might be misremembering “you can’t become a starfleet officer based on information you downloaded from the internet, you have to actually go to class”.
Also, the Prime Directive is sus. “Oh, you can only access post-scarcity once you achieve warp travel.” What the fuck?
Warp drives and replicators are not a prerequisite to post-scarcity, nor are they a solution to scarcity. As we all know on this site, capitalism manufactures scarcity. Earth became post scarcity when it transitioned to communism, not when it invented the replicator or the warp drive. If you are talking about giving post-scarcity to primitive planets, then what you are talking about is invading their planet, dismantling their government, and setting up a socialist state. That’s what the Borg do. If you want to discuss whether the Federation ought to move over to the Borg way of doing things, then I’m happy to have that conversation.
Capitalism didn’t bring scarcity into being and communism won’t end it. It might be better at distributing resources equitably and preserving them longer, but the physical reality of the universe is that there’s e.g. only so much grain you can get out of the ground every year and so many years at a certain level of production that the soil can sustain, so much land to be cleared for agriculture etc. The Earth is functionally a closed system and as much as communism might allow for technology enabling its matter to remain in a state useful for human social reproduction for far longer than under a capitalist mode of production, there’s no solution to physical phenomena being fundamentally irreversible reactions. Even if we were to expand the reach of our species to the stars, that’s still just kicking the can really far down the road.
Picard Season 2 established that Starfleet (not the Federation, oops) rejected Seven specifically because of the implants, which has implications for their supposed tolerance of a hypothetical peaceful Borg. Seven became a Fenris Ranger instead.
If you are talking about giving post-scarcity to primitive planets, then what you are talking about is invading their planet, dismantling their government, and setting up a socialist state. That’s what the Borg do. If you want to discuss whether the Federation ought to move over to the Borg way of doing things, then I’m happy to have that conversation.
That is what I’m saying, yes. I don’t really believe that the Federation is justified in allowing the existence of slavery and feudalism and capitalism in the galaxy and I don’t believe there’s a sound reason to force people to go through the misery of historical development by themselves. Hence, a hypothetical peaceful Borg that practices internationalism on a galactic scale.
Picard Season 2 established that Starfleet (not the Federation, oops) rejected Seven specifically because of the implants
Oof. That sucks.
and I don’t believe there’s a sound reason to force people to go through the misery of historical development by themselves
Because if you let capitalist species climate change themselves back into the stone age then you limit the number of fascist empires running around in space making problems for everyone else. Gene Roddenberry was a big believer in the idea that a closed minded people does not deserve to go into space and meet the diversity that is out there. Honestly, I wouldn’t want the humans of the real world going into space either. They’d fuck everything up. Aliens, if you’re spying on us right now: please go away. We’re not ready to meet you.
So you think the Galactic International would allow capitalist worlds to stay capitalist, or that the process of uplifting them wouldn’t be revolutionary at its core.
Something just feels gross to me about that kind of manifest destiny thinking. Starfleet’s reasoning on the subject is that if you don’t allow cultures to develop independently, you end up with less diversity, which can have terrible consequences down the line if the One Way your civilisation does things can’t cope with a novel situation. We actually have that going on on Earth. Every country is pressured to do things the capitalist way, and that’s why none of them is taking appropriate action on the climate crisis. There aren’t any countries left that have novel solutions to offer. In Australia, the white people took over the running of things from the indigenous by force and it didn’t go well. They suck at it.
Every country being pressured under capitalist imperialism is fundamentally different from revolutionary internationalism. What we have happening on Earth is absolutely nothing like a hypothetical that uplifts people out of their material conditions; imperialist “development” is not internationalist, it’s superexploitation. There is no interest to improve anything for anyone but the rich.
Furthermore, indigenous people weren’t peacefully assimilated, they were killed and imprisoned and enslaved and raped and had their children kidnapped and their languages/cultures made illegal and all of this was done through the use of incredible violence. Manifest destiny was all just colonialist propaganda. The White Man’s burden was a lie that whitey told himself to not feel bad about murdering and raping everyone. Never, at any point, did the empires actually try to make things better for other people around the world. It was always for themselves.
The entire point of the Borg is that they’re what the federation would be without the prime directive and a value placed on consent. If the Borg asked nicely, they’d be the Federation.
The Federation(oop, it was Starfleet) initially rejected Seven’s attempt to officially join because of the Borg implants. Clearly not.Also, the Prime Directive is sus. “Oh, you can only access post-scarcity once you achieve warp travel.” What the fuck?
I’ve never heard of that, source? It sounds like you might be misremembering “you can’t become a starfleet officer based on information you downloaded from the internet, you have to actually go to class”.
Warp drives and replicators are not a prerequisite to post-scarcity, nor are they a solution to scarcity. As we all know on this site, capitalism manufactures scarcity. Earth became post scarcity when it transitioned to communism, not when it invented the replicator or the warp drive. If you are talking about giving post-scarcity to primitive planets, then what you are talking about is invading their planet, dismantling their government, and setting up a socialist state. That’s what the Borg do. If you want to discuss whether the Federation ought to move over to the Borg way of doing things, then I’m happy to have that conversation.
Capitalism didn’t bring scarcity into being and communism won’t end it. It might be better at distributing resources equitably and preserving them longer, but the physical reality of the universe is that there’s e.g. only so much grain you can get out of the ground every year and so many years at a certain level of production that the soil can sustain, so much land to be cleared for agriculture etc. The Earth is functionally a closed system and as much as communism might allow for technology enabling its matter to remain in a state useful for human social reproduction for far longer than under a capitalist mode of production, there’s no solution to physical phenomena being fundamentally irreversible reactions. Even if we were to expand the reach of our species to the stars, that’s still just kicking the can really far down the road.
Picard Season 2 established that Starfleet (not the Federation, oops) rejected Seven specifically because of the implants, which has implications for their supposed tolerance of a hypothetical peaceful Borg. Seven became a Fenris Ranger instead.
That is what I’m saying, yes. I don’t really believe that the Federation is justified in allowing the existence of slavery and feudalism and capitalism in the galaxy and I don’t believe there’s a sound reason to force people to go through the misery of historical development by themselves. Hence, a hypothetical peaceful Borg that practices internationalism on a galactic scale.
🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
fair lol
Oof. That sucks.
Because if you let capitalist species climate change themselves back into the stone age then you limit the number of fascist empires running around in space making problems for everyone else. Gene Roddenberry was a big believer in the idea that a closed minded people does not deserve to go into space and meet the diversity that is out there. Honestly, I wouldn’t want the humans of the real world going into space either. They’d fuck everything up. Aliens, if you’re spying on us right now: please go away. We’re not ready to meet you.
So you think the Galactic International would allow capitalist worlds to stay capitalist, or that the process of uplifting them wouldn’t be revolutionary at its core.
Interesting
Something just feels gross to me about that kind of manifest destiny thinking. Starfleet’s reasoning on the subject is that if you don’t allow cultures to develop independently, you end up with less diversity, which can have terrible consequences down the line if the One Way your civilisation does things can’t cope with a novel situation. We actually have that going on on Earth. Every country is pressured to do things the capitalist way, and that’s why none of them is taking appropriate action on the climate crisis. There aren’t any countries left that have novel solutions to offer. In Australia, the white people took over the running of things from the indigenous by force and it didn’t go well. They suck at it.
Every country being pressured under capitalist imperialism is fundamentally different from revolutionary internationalism. What we have happening on Earth is absolutely nothing like a hypothetical that uplifts people out of their material conditions; imperialist “development” is not internationalist, it’s superexploitation. There is no interest to improve anything for anyone but the rich.
Furthermore, indigenous people weren’t peacefully assimilated, they were killed and imprisoned and enslaved and raped and had their children kidnapped and their languages/cultures made illegal and all of this was done through the use of incredible violence. Manifest destiny was all just colonialist propaganda. The White Man’s burden was a lie that whitey told himself to not feel bad about murdering and raping everyone. Never, at any point, did the empires actually try to make things better for other people around the world. It was always for themselves.